One of the topics I touched upon in my botched Ignite Phoenix presentation was the magic of human flight. The theme of the talk was The View from the Window Seat, which was mostly about perspective. One of the perspectives I described was the magic of human flight. I had a wonderful slide to illustrate the feeling. It showed a young boy staring out an airplane window in awe. I didn’t need to show a photo of a typical perspective. Just imagine a business traveler, checking his email on his blackberry one last time before take-off while wondering why the hell the flight is 7 minutes late. Louis CK had a popular rant about this. Instead of being amazed at the fact that we’re flying through the sky at up to 500 miles per hour, we’re often fretting about how little our seats recline or how much the seat in front of us is reclined.
I always try to get a window seat when I fly. I always stare out the window during take-off and landing. I try to force myself to maintain the perspective of someone who is flying for the first time. I try to be that kid. I try to see the magic of it all, even though I’ve seen it hundreds of times.
This perspective can be applied elsewhere. In a way, your daily happiness can be proportional to how easily amazed you are. I envy people who say “wow” to things I take for granted.
Human flight truly is a magical thing. Just one hundred years ago, the richest and most powerful people in the world—kings and emperors—couldn’t do with all their spoils or slaves what I can do for the cost of a day or two of work.
I was reminded of this today while reading a book recommended to me by my friend John Murch. It’s called, “Eat People: And Other Unapologetic Rules for Game-Changing Entrepreneurs.” I’m only a few pages in, but the author starts by saying these rich and successful entrepreneurs actually got rich by making everyone and society richer. While walking through a museum, “some wealthy dead French guy’s house,” the author remarks that he would never trade places with that rich guy, adding, “this guy was one of the richest in the world, but he’d be considered living under the poverty line in our day.”
While the book will surely go on to make a different point, I couldn’t help but reflect on the idea that we cannot and should not take for granted the magic and wonder of the world around us.
It’s all about perspective.